Star Wars: The Old Republic has been a successful game with its growing numbers of subscribed members. There is no doubt it is due to its immense and addicting gameplay, and luckily for me I am one of the 1.7 million members.
After wanting The Old Republic ever since it's announcement back in 2009, I decided to use GameStop gift cards, that I was going to use for various games, on the Collector's Edition of Star Wars: The Old Republic, and I don't regret a thing!
The best Collector's Edition I've ever had
The Old Republic is an MMO that is not too similar to other MMOs already out there; if you have played other MMOs, then you will be fairly comfortable with The Old Republic. The Old Republic is not simply "Kill x amount of creatures that look alike" or "Collect x amount of items that have the same texture", the missions that The Old Republic has is vast and different.
That's not the only vast in the world of the Old Republic Universe, the different worlds you get to visit are amazing as well. Players get to travel to planets such as Dromund Kass, Hutta, Alderaan and many other places; on those planets are diverse life forms and creatures. When you travel to a planet, you see the creatures that actually belong there; Bormus and Colicoids will only be found on Balmorra and Vicious Vorn Tigers will only be found on Alderaan.
Cute little Bormu on the plains of Balmorra
The graphics for the worlds, creatures and everything else is extremely well done; as far as I've seen, textures are not reused over and over, characters each have different character models and animations are smooth. The graphics are not too serious looking, it's a little more cartoony, but it works, nothing looks out of place at all. The environment of planets are stunning as well, Dromund Kass is covered in a lush jungle environment and Hutta is a polluted planet with hostile creatures. Each planet is significant in it's own way and doesn't reuse anything from another planet.
Jungles of Dromund Kaas
The story behind The Old Republic is basically that there is a war between the Sith Empire and the Galactic Republic. You learn more about different people involved in the war on both sides during the countless amounts of missions the game has. Through the missions, you also learn some back story to other Star Wars related characters, like Revan and his story of being a Jedi and a Sith. The overall story also branches off into comics and novels, but you don't need read those in order to play the game because The Old Republic focuses on Class Missions, which are missions that are exclusive for the different classes that the game offers.
What I really like about The Old Republic that makes it different than other MMOs are the Space missions that it has. The Space missions requires you to have a ship first, but once you acquire one then you get to do battle missions or escort missions; I've only done a couple of Space missions. The missions don't just put you in a black void with little white dots representing stars, they correspond to whatever place you are nearby.
Getting ready to travel on my ship...IN SPACE!
You don't need to do just missions in the game, like most MMOs there are PvP battles. For now there are three different PvP warzones: Voidstar, Huttball and Alderaan. Voidstar puts two teams against each other as one team attempts to fight their way to a ship's data core while the other side defends the data core. Huttball is soccer style warzone, but with fire pits; each team must get the ball to the apposing team's goal in order to gain a point. The Alderaan Warzone puts the Republic and Imperial players against one another in order to gain control of turrets to bring down one another's transport ship.
When you start the game, you get to choose which side you want to be on - the Dark side or the Light Side. If you choose to help the Sith Empire with the Dark Side, you get to choose from four different classes: Sith Warrior, Sith Inquisitor, Bounty Hunter and Imperial Agent. The Galactic Empire has Jedi Knights, Jedi Consulars, Smugglers and Troopers on their side. After selecting your class, you get to pick what species you want, but not all species are available for all classes.
After selecting your class and species, you then get to start your character customization, which is decent. I wish that the customization was more vast like everything else in the game; customization was the only problem I have come across in the game. It's not like the customization is horrible, but I was just expecting better.
Overall, the game is amazing; it's doesn't stay away from the Star Wars franchise, there are many recognizable creatures, planets, people and other things from the Star Wars Expanded Universe. It's different from other MMOs I have played, but the basic style of the genre is still there. The graphics are solid and so is the sound; you'll recognize some of the music and you'll have a blast with all the cantina music you will hear. I've been having a blast with The Old Republic and I have barely scratched the surface of the game even though I have been playing nonstop ever since I got it. I'm currently playing as a Powertech Bounty Hunter, and I'm only on the first chapter for his class missions; I also have seven different classes to play as.
Star Wars: The Old Republic is one of the greatest games I have every played, unfortunately it has a subscription fee but luckily I was able to afford a 60-day time card. The only disappointing thing I have run into is the customization, it wasn't what I was expecting but it isn't bad. BioWare did an excellent job on The Old Republic, kudos to them for making an outstanding game once again.
Star Wars: The Old Republic - 9.5/10
